Rapid Versa

I typed it into Google with no luck.

"The pub door flew in and a fast stream of silent drinkers moved into position. The air was immediately machine-gunned with a rapid series of orders - "Guinness - Whiskey - Stout - Gin - Beer - Rum - Port - Beer - Stout - Stout-". There followed a silence as the day's troubles were washed away with great liver-crippling draughts of alcohol. Stock still they stood, waiting the warming glow that makes us acceptable to all men and vice-versa. The first one to feel a powerful benefit was blind George Devine, a thin white El Greco figure with two sightless sockets."

Any ideas? It is a page of a book which has fallen out. This was Chapter Three on page 31.